I never collected videos (magnetic video tapes). I knew since the 1970s that they are not durable. But I was busy watching, taping and exchanging, for friends, the number one video eagle being Peter von Bagh in Helsinki. In Berlin, top guys were Frank Arnold and Helmut Arlt, and in Stockholm friends like Terhi and teachers and students at the Film Department of the Stockholm University. I kept constantly organizing video evenings for friends.In year 1983 I only had VHS players, later also Betamax, which was favoured by the big collectors.These cassettes I kept playing this year.

Sunday, May 01, 1983

Kaidan / Kwaidan. JP 1965. D: Masaki Kobayashi. Fantastival. A 16mm print dubbed in English. A short version with three episodes only. 1: Black Hair: returning home, the samurai meets his wife as a ghost. 2: Snow Woman: under the eyes watching from the sky the woodcutter falls in love with the woman who is death. 3: The Blind Biwa Player, the story of Miminashi Hoichi, who becomes the court musician of the Heike Clan, long extinct. Because he is blind he is not aware that his listeners are ghosts of the dead. For protection, his whole skin is painted with holy sutras, but something is neglected, and Hoichi returns home earless. - Missing: 4: Chawan no saka / Kuvajainen / A Cup of Tea / [Reflection].I Was a Teenage Werewolf. US 1957. D: Gene Fowler, Jr. Fantastival. DF. The notorious film proved to be a rather good thriller. Of the werewolf movies I rate this higher than Stuart Walker's and John Landis' variations. There is true sadness in Michael Landon's performance.Son of Frankenstein. US 1939. D: Rowland V. Lee. Fantastival. Universal's third Frankenstein movie, boasting a great cast: Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, and Lionel Atwill. Missing is the gravity of the direction, cinematography and art direction of the predecessors.Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed. GB 1969. D: Terence Fisher. Fantastival. DF. Peter Cushing's determined performance. Nothing can contain Frankenstein's scientific passion. There is always a cellar for a laboratory, medical instruments to be stolen, corpses to be opened, and brains to be inserted into new bodies. There is a Gothic force in the laboratory scenes with their illuminated glass tanks with their bizarre human experiments.It Came From Beneath the Sea. US 1955. D: Robert Gordon. Fantastival. "Sie sind gekommen, um Dich zu holen!". In the muddy bottom of the Pacific ocean a monster mutant, a giant octopus has been born as a result of nuclear testing. Broken vessels and plundered fish-catches give us the reason to suspect the worst. Finally the scoundrel appears in Frisco Bay, proceeding to destroy the Golden Gate bridge. Ray Harryhausen's animation is the only reason to watch this.Metshte navstretshu / Begegnung im All / Encounter in Space / A Dream Come True. SU 1963. D: Mihail Krjukov & Otar Koberidze. Fantastival. DF. The dream of a young man and woman of a space adventure. A sacrifice to rescue a creature from a foreign planet. Childish, without intensity.7.5.1983 TV Hitparade. Golden Earring: Twilight Zone. Culture Club: Church Of The Poison Mind. Duran Duran: There's Something I Should Know. Rocker's Revenge: The Harder They Come. Spandau Ballet: True. etc.The Plague of the Zombies. GB 1966. D: John Gilling. Continuation-Fantastival. DF. The squire who has returned from Haiti starts to apply voodoo to manage his mansion in Cornwall. One villager after another turns into a zombie, and are found toiling in the mines of the squire as his free workforce. An old doctor finds the voodoo dolls, and in the ensuing fight they catch fire. Simultaneously also the zombies flare up in flames, and in the final battle they destroy both the mine and their slave-driver.Nana / Nana. FR 1926. D: Jean Renoir. Arsenal. A 135 min presentation of a brilliant print from the DDR archive. Lush, vital, brimming with jokes, finally tragic. Lighter than the works of Stroheim. Foolish Wives is the obvious model. A Stroheimian sense of a Weltanschauung is missing.The Train / Juna. US/FR/IT 1964. D: John Frankenheimer. TV, DDR, DF. OK thriller.Le Fantôme de la liberté. TV, DF, [3]. Feels more diluted each time. My favourite sequence: the one where the naked woman plays the piano and the necrophiliac police commissioner gets a telephone call from beyond the grave. - I keep thinking and the screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière and the producer Serge Silberman urged B. to continue when he had nothing more to say.Secret Beyond the Door... TV, DF, [2]. Brilliant as a visual-musical composition. As a drama it remains hanging in mid-air: it is either too pared down or not enough.The Big Store. VHS [x] +Duck Soup. VHS [x]. The Marx Bros. require a cinema screen and a good audience. And the right mood. Now these were missing.12.5.1983 Helmut Arlt: Tex Avery cartoons, Italian peplum trailers. Begone Dull Care. CA 1949. D: Norman McLaren & Evelyn Lambart. Oscar Peterson trio.Die Nibelungen 1: Siegfried / Nibelungen 1: Siegfriedin kuolema. DE 1924. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. The duration of the presentation was 160 min. A majestic pulse; rich and fascinating; the enchantment of the legend. A firm monumental touch with room for the striking detail.Die Nibelungen 2: Kriemhilds Rache / Nibelungen 2: Kriemhildin kosto. DE 1924. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. The duration of the presentation was 180 min. More gloomy, static and frantic than the first part. The story of an obsession.La petite marchande d'allumettes. FR 1928. D: Jean Renoir. A print with English intertitles and a fine Romantic music track. A touching adaptation of Andersen's fairy-tale, and not at all one of R's least works.14.5.1983 TV Hitparade. Mike Batt: Love Makes You Crazy. Wall of Voodoo: Mexican Radio. Toto: I Won't Hold You Back. Joe Jackson: Steppin' Out. Divine: Shake It Up. etc.Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari. TV. [4]. ZDF reconstruction, probably the best available version. Oddly, this film, already archaic when it was made, keeps growing each time. The only annoying element was the boring whining music, which I quickly turned off.15.5.1983 Helmut Arlt. Clips from: Der Raub der Mona Lisa (DE 1931, D: Géza von Bolváry), Zu neuen Ufern (Vieraille rannoille, DE 1937, D: Detlef Sierck. Zarah Leander), Ben-Hur (Ben-Hur, US 1926, D: Fred Niblo), Premiere (Ensi-ilta, DE 1937, D: Géza von Bolváry. Zarah Leander), Die Frau, nach der man sich sehnt (Arvoituksellinen nainen, DE 1929, D: Curtis Bernhardt. Marlene Dietrich). Plus complete:- Dinner for One / Der 90. Geburtstag oder Dinner for One (TVM, DE 1963, D: Heinz Dunkhase). The perfect butler provides the perfect service, although all the four guests invited are already dead. "The same procedure as every year".- Berlin: die Symphonie der Grossstadt. [2]Frau im Mond 1-2 / Matka Kuuhun. DE 1929. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. The duration of the presentation was 200 min, certainly much too slow. L. clearly at his weakest.M. [2] - Revisited after 14 years. - Seeing this the second time was totally different. A nimble, incisive, stimulating "living X-ray" of the big city shaken up by the little mad pedophile-murderer. The structuring of experience. The idea of montage. - It was illuminating to see this in a cinema in Berlin. The delighted audience laughed knowingly at authentic expressions of Berlin slang. I realized that this dark film is also Lang's most humoristic.You and Me / Ehdonalaisesti vapauteen. US 1939. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. A failed attempt at a synthesis of the musical and the Lehrstück. One of L's weakest efforts.Liliom. FR 1934. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. A surprisingly successful attempt at French flavour, but no masterpiece.Hangmen Also Die! Arsenal. [2]An American Guerrilla in the Philippines / Viidakon sissit. US 1950. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. Tyrone Power and Tom Ewell as guerrilla in the Philippines. L. at his most impersonal but not at his worst.21.5.1983 TV Hitparade. Peter Tosh: Johnny B. Goode. George Clinton: Atomic Dog. Thompson Twins: We Are Detective. New Order: Blue Monday. etc.22.5.1983 TV: Luis Buñuel - mon dernier soupir. The ingenious hidalgo in good spirits in his last interview.24.6.1983 TV Bananas. Anne Bertucci: Number One Contender. The Cocoanuts: Did You Have To Love Me The Way You Did. etc.25.5.1983 Arsenal 20 Years Jubilee (the first screening reconstructed):Das Wachsfigurenkabinett. DE 1924. D: Paul Leni. Arsenal 20 Years Jubilee. Duration 75 min, a bad Czech print. A charming fantasy of a poet, for whom the characters of the waxworks become alive. +Lehrer im Wandel. DE 1963. D: Alexander Kluge. Arsenal 20 Years Jubilee. +Notizen aus dem Altmühltal. DE 1962. D: Hans Rolf Strobel, Heinrich Tichawsky. Arsenal 20 Years Jubilee26.5.1983 Helmut Arlt. Clips from: Der Kaiser von Kalifornien (DE 1936, D: Luis Trenker), A Connecticut Yankee (Jenkki kuningas Arthurin hovissa, US 1931, D: David Butler. Will Rogers). A Damsel in Distress [x].28.5.1983 TV Hitparade. Tracey Ullmann: Can't Break Away. Man Parrich: Hip Hop Be Bop. Grandmaster Flash: The Message. etc.La Vie est à nous. FR 1936. D: Jean Renoir. Arsenal. A weak print. Politically a film of its time, but the sincerity is still affecting.29.5.1983 Helmut Arlt:- The March of Time: Hollywood und der Krieg (1943)- Päivä Karl Marxin haudalla / A Day at the Grave of Karl Marx. FI 1983. D: Peter von Bagh. VHS- Das blaue Licht. DE 1932. D: Leni Riefenstahl- Tiefland / Alamaa. DE 1940-1952. D: Leni Riefenstahl- I Could Go On Singing. the second reelCloak and Dagger / Viitta ja tikari. US 1946. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. Gary Cooper fights Nazis in Switzerland and Italy and falls in love with Lilli Palmer.Man Hunt / Ihmismetsästys. US 1941. D: Fritz Lang. Arsenal. A wonderful discovery, one of L's best, a much finer Resistance thriller than Cloak and Dagger. L. at the height of his visual intensity. Walter Pidgeon is L's most sympathetic hero.

Saturday, April 02, 1983

Fury / Kiihko. US 1936. D: Fritz Lang. VHS. The commencement (Spencer Tracy's ostensible guilt, the process of the lynching) is actually rather conventional. First the course of the trial and the account of Tracy's rage really ignite the film. For Lang it must have been personal....WEST BERLIN4.4.1983 a video and film night with Helmut Arlt.- Clips from Kiss Me Kate / Anna suukko, äkäpussi (US 1953, George Sidney) and Since You Went Away / Kunnes palaat (US 1944, John Cromwell).- Tex Avery cartoons and Gene Nelson dance sequences.- TV: Hier ist der Londoner Rundfunk: Der Deutsche Dienst der BBC 1938-1945.- On 35mm film: from a silent comedy compilation: Pearl White - Snub Pollard - Charlie Chase.- On 35mm film in scope: the last reel from I Could Go on Singing / Suuri voitto (GB 1963, Ronald Neame, with Judy Garland, Dirk Bogarde.Night of the Demon / Paholaisen palvelija. GB 1957. D: Jacques Tourneur. tv. DF. A demonic nocturne. Lucid cinematic storytelling. This goes to prove that T's greatness was not dependent on Lewton.Directed by John Ford. US 1971. D: Peter Bogdanovich. Arsenal. A fine full-length portrait. Clips from 26 movies. Among the interviewees: John Wayne, James Stewart, Henry Fonda, and John Ford, himself. Invited to Monument Valley to be interviewed, the only thing he says is: "Cut!"Vortex. US 1982. D: Beth B & Scott B. Arsenal. Lethally boring avantgarde from New York.Diva / Diiva. FR 1981. D: Jean-Jacques Beineix. Kurbel. Brilliant but with little substance.Броненосец Потёмкин / Panssarilaiva Potjomkin / The Battleship Potyomkin. [x]. Arsenal. MoMA 16mm print with the Edmund Meisel score, sound speed. Meisel's score struck me as sharp, clear, and Eislerian. - Discovering montage. Griffith: parallelism. Gance: escalation towards ecstasy, explosion. Eisenstein: dialectics, the unity of the opposites, dynamics, the multi-layered reality expressed with a bite; clarity and multidimensionality simultaneously. Montage as the method of modern experience. The overflow of events, impressions and information pushes us to find ways to express the abundance of life without clichés. E. searches for primordial images and proto-images and on the other hand hyper-sensitive ways of expression.Pat and Mike / Amor sekaantuu peliin. US 1952. D: George Cukor. tv. A sensitive and intelligent comedy. Spencer Tracy is the coach who solves Katharine Hepburn's strange ego problem, because of which she always putts the golf ball askew: it is because of the overbearing male friend in the background.The Academy Awards for the films of 1982. Great show, little point about the statues.14.4.1983 a video and film evening at Helmut Arlt. Video: Broadway Melody of 1938 / Broadway Melody 1938 (US 1937, Roy Del Ruth). +The Love Goddesses [2] 35mm16.4.1983 TV: ARD-Hitparade. Culture Club: Do You Really Want To Hurt Me. David Bowie: Let's Dance. Bananarama: Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye. Malcolm McLaren: Buffalo Gals.Арсенал / Arsenal. UA-SU 1929. D: Alexander Dovzhenko. Arsenal. [2] An unexcusably bad print ruined the viewing. The fine rhythm, the alternation of the slow and the fast scenes, was ruined.Criss Cross / Elämän ja kuoleman leikki. US 1948. D: Robert Siodmak. tv DDR. DF. A taut movie, dubbed the Tristan and Isolde of film noir by Carlos Clarens, a kind of a remake of Siodmak's The Killers, Burt this time with Yvonne De Carlo. Its sturdy grip never lets go. In the climax, the big heist, the camera ascends into heaven and follows the course of the crime from above. There is a fateful sound in the final scene.La Boulangère de Monceau. FR 1962. D: Eric Rohmer +La Carrière de Suzanne. FR 1963. D: Eric Rohmer. Institut Francais. The two first filmed entries to Les Contes moraux. The first four are the best. Made with a mini budget financially but with an A budget spiritually.Litan. FR 1981. D: Jean-Pierre Mocky. Fantastival. This might even have been a fascinating dream adventure, unless there hadn't been that terrible screaming music.22.4.1983 Fantastival gala evening:- Adventures of Captain Marvel (US 1941, D: John English, William Witney) - pilot episode. The whole series was screened during the festival, and I saw some four of them. Shazam!- Hammer trailers- Ray Harryhausen as special guest- an audience contest of the best monster dress (the winner was a werewolf)Letajushtshi korabl / Das fliegende Schiff. UA-SU 1960. D: Mihail Juferov & Artur Voitetski. Fantastival. DF. By accident this film based on a Russian folk tale was included in the festival. Not up to the Ptushko standards.Tsherez ternii k zvojzdam 1-2 / Vaikeuksien kautta tähtiin / Die Frau aus dem All / Per aspera ad astra / To the Stars by Hard Ways. SU 1980. D: Rikhard Viktorov. Fantastival. DF. From deep space, from a polluted planet, a space woman is rescued on Earth. A children's movie, and too childish for that.High Noon. [2] TV DDR DF. Now felt too self-important and synthetic.24.4.1983 simultaneously on another channel the Eurovision song contest, including Carola Häggkvist: Främling / The Stranger. Britain and Spain are good, Finland not the weakest. Trash it is, but why does it have to be that way.La Collectionneuse / Keräilijätär. FR 1967. D: Eric Rohmer. Institut Francais. Two male friends collect art. In a beach villa they meet a girl who collects men (although she denies it: "je ne suis pas une collectionneuse"). The smile of Haydée Politoff is captivating.She / Kuolematon kuningatar. GB 1965. D: Robert Day. Fantastival. DF. An awkward H. Rider Haggard adaptation starring Ursula Andress (Undress, but of course "nothing" is shown). Only the shock ending if effective: in an instant the eternal queen ages a thousand years turning into a wrinkled heap, skeleton, ashes.The Snake Woman. GB 1961. D: Sidney J. Furie. Fantastival. DF. A bad horror movie from the moors of England. The doctor conducts weird experiments with snake venom. The superstitious villagers conduct arson and burn the doctor's house, but a baby is secretly rescued. 20 years later in the moors at night there is a snake woman wreaking vengeance. The inspector of Scotland Yard will not believe in it until he discovers the skin of the woman from the moor - the snake monster has shed its skin.20 Million Miles to Earth / Venuksen valloittajat. US 1957. D: Nathan Juran. Fantastival. The research capsule from a spacecraft to Venus hits the coast of Italy. It includes a little egg. Out of the egg gel moults a lizard-like creature which, when aroused, turns into a raving beast. In the atmosphere of the Earth it swells into supernatural proportions and destroys half of Rome until the armed forces of Italy bring it down. Beautiful animation by Ray Harryhausen.Petlja Oriona / Orionin silmukka / Phaeton an Erde. SU 1980. D: Vasili Levin. Fantastival. DF. Gulp - I don't remember anything about this. In 2008 I read from the IMDB: "A strange phenomenon has been noticed on the outskirts of our Solar system that quickly approaches the Earth. It's called Orion's Loop. A spaceship with a crew of people and androids identical to them is sent to intercept the anomaly. But strange events start happening as the spaceship approaches the mysterious loop. Written by Boris Shafir."Rekopis znaleziony w Saragossie / Saragossan salaisuus. PL 1964. D: Wojciech J. Has. Fantastival. DF. An imaginatively sprawling, teasingly erotic, labyrinthine adventure from Napoleon's war in Spain. Borgesian-Sternbergian cinema.Ex-Convict. US 1904. D: Edwin S. Porter. Arsenal. The ex-convict is down and out. He saves the life of a little girl on the street. Later he enters the girl's house and is mistaken for a burglar. The girl saves the day, and the family starts to help the ex-convict. Primitive cinema.Native Land. US 1942. D: Leo Hurwitz & Paul Strand. Arsenal. Beautiful, engrossing, accusatory, upsetting, noble. Stories from the fight for civil rights and violence in the USA. Diamond-sharp cinematography.How to Make a Monster. US 1958. D: Herbert L. Strock. Fantastival. DF. The new bosses of the film studio decide that the age of the horror movies is over and fire the special make-up master. Soon there is a series of horrible murders at the studio, conducted by Dracula, Frankenstein's monster, etc., the new bosses as the first victims...Fade to Black / ... kun valot sammuvat. US 1980. D: Vernon Zimmermann. Fantastival. I don't like the current "movies on movies" trend, but there are some saving traits here. The total alienation of the movie freak from reality. He now only lives through the movies: Kiss of Death, White Heat, The Seven Year Itch, The Prince and the Showgirl. The main actor has adopted the Tom Ewell manners. His character is one step beyond - to the worse - from Ewell's character in The Seven Year Itch. Rickie Sherman 15 years later.

Tuesday, March 01, 1983

Episode 1: The Shores of the Cosmic OceanOriginal Air Date—28 September 1980Episode 2: One Voice in the Cosmic FugueOriginal Air Date—5 October 1980Episode 3: Harmony of the WorldsOriginal Air Date—12 October 1980Episode 4: Heaven and HellOriginal Air Date—19 October 1980Episode 5: Blues for a Red PlanetOriginal Air Date—26 October 1980Episode 6: Travelers' TalesOriginal Air Date—2 November 1980Episode 7: The Backbone of NightOriginal Air Date—9 November 1980Episode 8: Journeys in Space and TimeOriginal Air Date—16 November 1980Episode 9: The Lives of the StarsOriginal Air Date—23 November 1980Episode 10: The Edge of ForeverOriginal Air Date—30 November 1980Episode 11: The Persistence of MemoryOriginal Air Date—7 December 1980Episode 12: Encyclopedia GalacticaOriginal Air Date—14 December 1980Episode 13: Who Speaks for Earth?Original Air Date—21 December 1980Carl Sagan

Muriel / Muriel ou Le Temps d'un retour. FR/IT 1963. D: Alain Resnais. Jean Cayrol. Fkl / Fh. Belongs to a small elite group of cinema: a film which creates its own unique way of expression. Uneasy relationships. Traumatic impact of the Algerian war. Bold experimentation which is not an end in itself.Gion bayashi / Les Musiciens de Gion / Gion Festival Music. JP 1953. D: Kenji Mizoguchi. Piercing, sensitive, glorious, ethnographically genuine account of the Gion geisha life: the tea ceremony, the music, the dance, the financial and property relationships. One of M's top achievements.Nahapet / Naapet - en kärna av liv. AM-SU 1977. D: Henrik Malian. tv. A draggingly monotonous account of an Armenian farmer who loses all in the 1915 genocide and dies inside but recovers finally gradually.6.3.1983 TV: Jean Sibelius II. FI. Fine.Shoulder Arms / Kivääri olalle vie! US 1918. Charles Chaplin. VHS. Filling the blanks among C's First National masterpieces. I had probably never seen this one either in its entirety before.Tauno Palo. FI 1981. D: Peter von Bagh. VHS. A good portrait. Drawback: a part of Palo's address is in the form of an answer in such a way that one would expect to hear the question as well. Less intensive than B's best.Moi, un noir. FR 1958. D: Jean Rouch. VHS. Ethnofiction of a young black man in Treichville, Abidjan, Ivory Coast, in the last days of the colonial era, first person monologue covering all aspects of life from finding a woman to melancholy drinking. My knowledge of French was not good enough to understand all.Mizoguchi Kenji no keroku / Kenji Mizoguchi, the Life of a Film Director. JP 1975. Orig. 150 min, this was 135 min. Fkl / Fst. A thorough interview-based documentary with screenwriter Yoshikata Yoda, actress Kinuyo Tanaka, etc. Perfectionism: during shooting, KM never left even for a leak, instead he had a special bottle. His Platonic love to Kinuyo Tanaka.Musashino fujin / The Lady of Musashino. JP 1951. D: Kenji Mizoguchi. Fkl / Fh. For the Lady (Kinuyo Tanaka), Musashino is a garden that needs cultivation. For the young man, it is a dream of fertility. After-war intrigues and confused relationships. Tokyo spreads like an amoeba and destroys nature. Sumptuous, painterly sense of nature. Splendid.Inter Rail. SE 1981. D: Birgitta Svensson. tv. I saw the conclusion only.Air Force / Ilma on kohtalomme. US 1943. D: Howard Hawks. Fkl / Fst. A great epic on the experiences of the crew of an American bomber plane in the aerial warfare in the Pacific . No taste of paper this time from a script by Dudley Nichols. The action of the Hawksian group has now been transferred from a self-sufficient micro-world to a large context. As a result, Air Force has become quite a Fordian movie.18.3.1983 TV: That's Hollywood 10: Saturday Matinee Heroes. US 1977. Fox TV. P: Jack Haley. Batman, Captain Marvel, Popeye, Captain America, Green Hornet, The Lone Ranger, Red Ryder, Dagwood and Blondie / Helmi ja Heikki, Little Orphan Annie, Dick Tracy, Flash Gordon, Star Wars.19.3.1983 TV: Fönster mot TV-världen: Kina. A Chinese melodrama which brings to mind the archaic era of the cinema, the 1910s. A young girl's way into crime, prison, repentance and atonement.19.3.1983 TV: Nadine Gordimer: Kärlek förbjuden. One episode from a series based on G's tales. The forbidden love affair between a white man and a black woman in South Africa.Uwasa no onna / A Woman of Rumour. JP 1954. D: Kenji Mizoguchi. 16mm. Fkl / Fh. The triangel of enslavement in a house of paid love. A young doctor functions as the mother's pimp and the daughter's "protector". The daugher hates her mother's fate, but her anger turns into revenge. She becomes the bordello madam, who turns her bitterness into ripping off men.23.3.1983 VHS: That's Hollywood 9: Marilyn Monroe. US 1978. Fox TV. EX: Audrey Solomon. P: Jack Haley. SC: Jack Havenick. Rare early footage, PR footage (Monkey Business, Some Like It Hot), MM in a TV commercial, the Korean tour. Film clips: The Seven Year Itch, Bus Stop, Genlemen Prefer Blondes, Love Happy, All About Eve, Clash By Night, We're Not Married!, Don't Bother to Knock, Niagara, There's No Business Like Show Business, How to Marry a Millionaire, Some Like It Hot. And footage from Something's Got to Give (including a small clip of previously unseen footage). Chaff put together in a hurry, but interesting.23.3.1983 VHS: Carl Sagan: Cosmos 1: Den kosmiska oceanens stränder. US 1980. The start is somewhat heavy going, I feel S's approach of a Homeric odyssey alienating. The concept is an imaginative space odyssey, a quest reaching to the end of time and space. Science fiction with the stress on the word science.Hangmen Also Die! / Myöskin pyövelit kuolevat. US 1943. D: Fritz Lang. VHS. The atmosphere of fear and terror in Prague under the rule of Heydrich. The pressure of the assassination and the concomitant retribution: will the chain of confidence break? Pared down and impressive. Unaffected nobility and dignity.La Pyramide humaine / Ihmispyramidi. FR 1958. D: Jean Rouch. b&w. VHS. On the friendship of white and black young people, Frenchmen and Africans on an intimate level. Takes place in Abidjan, where ?some young Frenchmen spend their holiday? What is the difference between reality and play-acting? ?A central location is a shipwrecked vessel? I made no notes immediately.Det stora äventyret / Suuri seikkailu / The Big Adventure. SE 1953. D: Arne Sucksdorff. VHS. A feature film by the documentarist and nature-lover. The adventures of two children in the nature during the four seasons. The two main plots: the fate of the fox family; the otter saved from the hunter's bullet secretly fostered by the children. Exquisite.Akasen chitai / Street of Shame / [the literal translation would be Red Light District]. JP 1956. D: Kenji Mizoguchi. Announced 94 min, actually 85 min. M's last movie is a richly realistic contemporary account of the Dreamland house of paid love in Yoshiwara. In this film as in Uwasa na onna the claim about M's Balzacian aspect proves well-founded. Each character is grippingly portrayed, the vicious circle of each is made clear. The background to all is the debate on prostitution in the Japanese parliament. There is an intention to fix the worst problems, but nothing happens. Dreamland is a favourite location for company parties. The hard-boiled, inhibited bosses buy entertainment for themselves. (The geisha system in Gion bayashi was different: the geisha did not need to sleep with the customer unless she wanted to.)Red River / Punainen virta. US 1948. D: Howard Hawks. A worn 16mm print. Duration announced 125 min, actually 110 min. This is the regular "voice version" with a spoken commentary by Walter Brennan. The original "book version", the definitive version, has written intertitles instead of spoken commentary, and the final showdown is reportedly more stylishly shot and edited. Fkl / Fst. I saw the film for the first time in its entirety. In summer 1973 at the army I had watch and was able to sneak to see a part only. - A magnificent epic western. Air Force and Red River make me rethink the difference between Ford and Hawks. Would there have been any essential difference if Ford had directed this? The un-idealized account of the ruthless Texan cattle baron, who does not flinch from robbery. A brilliant tribute to work and co-operation. The cattle stampede has apparently been as dangerous on location as it is made to look on screen.Giulietta degli spiriti / Giulietta ja viettelykset. IT 1965. D: Federico Fellini. Fkl / Fh. Gleefully inventive and embarrassingly candid. My first impression was that I prefer this to 8½. (Having seen 8½ on tv only, and I would not want to see Giulietta degli spiriti on tv.) The Fellinian spectacle is meant for the screen, not tv. I enjoy the fantastic jokes and marvellous colours. F's guilty confession. The ruthlessly treacherous male is a Fellini imitation. Stranger still, Sandra Milo seems to have been F's lover in reality, too.En sommarsaga / A Summer Saga. SE 1943. D: Arne Sucksdorff. VHS. +Människor i stad / People in the City. SE 1948. D: Arne Sucksdorff. VHS. +Trut! / The Seagull. SE 1944. D: Arne Sucksdorff. VHS. Enchantingly lyrical short documentaries.29.3.1983 VHS: Carl Sagan: Cosmos 2: En stämma i den kosmiska fugan. It picks up.Come and Get It / Tukkikuningas. US 1936. D: Howard Hawks & William Wyler. VHS. The first part, the original accumulation of capital, is directed by Hawks. The second part, the manners and mores in society circles, by Wyler. Frances Farmer in a dual role. The mother whom the lumber king, class-conscious and in search of a wealthy marriage, discards. And the daughter with whom the lumber king's son falls in love with. There is a strong drive in the first part, and the picture is an interesting sketch for Red River. The basic story is according to Hawks "the story of my grandfather". Walter Brennan has the same role in Come and Get It and Red River.

Tuesday, February 01, 1983

5.2.1983 8mm screening at Spectrum. A demonstration against nuclear power and a fight with the police at Gorleben.8.2.1983 TV: Hitchcock's Frenzy half-way on. I hate the movie, but there is such a drive in the images that I cannot turn it off. Ron Goodwin's music impressive, too. Sad how H. went down after Torn Curtain.Die Stadt der verlorenen Seelen. DE 1982. D: Rosa von Praunheim. video. Rubbish.Tally Brown. DE 1977. D: Rosa von Praunheim. video. Much better, a funny portrait of "the most unusual woman in the world", the bohemian singer and cabaret artist.In jenen Tagen / Autostrada. DE 1947. D: Helmut Käutner. Arsenal. A journey through the Third Reich narrated by a car (Opel Olympia), which lies as junk in a garage and tells the story of each of its owners. A fine movie with sensitivity and understanding.11.2.1983 video screening at Video-Bar Korrekt. Cinema Vitesse: TV im Off. DE 1983. Lethally bad and boring as is the location which pretends to be a cool place.12.2.1983 Nationalgalerie: Videokunst in Deutschland 1963-1982.- Ingo Günther: Video Voodoo (1980)- Marcel Odenbach: Freud gegen Marx ist die Devise 1982)- Manfred Kage: Video Mandala (1981, music creates image)- Friederike Pezold: Madame Cucumate - Videoplastik (1975, a totem of five monitors)- Ulrike Rosenbach: Wer hat Angst vor der schwarzen Frau (Medusaimagination - Venusdepression) (1982)- Ingo Günther: Hi Tao (1981) (six monitors showing the American highway)- Barbara Hammann: Neue Welle (1983)- Angelika Bader & Dietmar Tanterl: Ready Made Aide 1982 - Falkland Task Force South- Ursula Wevers: Horizontales / vertikales Springen (1979)- Peter Kolb: The Manhattan Tape ("video skyline")- Klaus vom Bruch: Videogeister (1983)- Wolf Vostell: Deutscher Anblick 1950-1963- Nam June Paik: Zen for TV (1963)In search for meaning.The Lusty Men. The long version. Filmkunst 66. [2]. Gets better. Good story, taut direction, sensitive handling of characters, juicy dialogue.Lucifer Rising. Video. [2]. Gets better. Explosive cinema, belongs to the Eisenstein current, taps from the archaic sources. Ecstatic, joy of sound and colour....STOCKHOLMThe Criminal Code. US 1931. D: Howard Hawks. Fkl / Fst. Apparently 16mm. H's stiff beginnings in sound film. Prison drama dragged by the burden of a filmed play. Walter Huston is the rough warden. Boris Karloff is the prisoner who has been appointed to revenge on the informer. A juvenile delinquent punished too harshly breaks down, until saved by the love of the warden's daughter. A rare milieu for H: the textile factory where the prisoners serve their sentence of hard labour and where the dirt, the noise and the forced pace of work almost bring the young protagonist down.Tiger Shark / Tiikerihai. US 1932. Fkl / Fh. 16mm. A pretty good yarn about tuna fishers in the Pacific. Edward G. Robinson in an unusual part as the Spanish captain who loses his arm as he saves his buddy from the jaws of the shark. The missing arm is replaced by a hook, which is not an advantage when the captain is to select a wife. The wife ends up in the arms of the buddy whom he saved. The sad story gets uplift from R's performance as the boastful captain.Orizuru Osen / The Downfall of Osen / Osen of the Paper-Cranes. JP 1934. D: Kenji Mizoguchi. Shot silent, synchronized afterwards with a commentaror's voice. A very bad 16mm print. The sorry status of the print made it impossible to make sense of the film. The story is archetypal M: a woman who helps the young man to a good start in life returns in the end as a prostitute rendered feeble-minded by venereal disease. The experience was strange since the film had both lengthy intertitles and spoken commentary. Plus English subtitles.Pay Day / Palkkapäivä. US 1922. Charles Chaplin. Video. Another late exercise in pure slapstick, now with the full relish made possible by a lack of hurry. I love the transition via the dollar sign.In a Lonely Place / Hermot pinnalla. US 1950. D: Nicholas Ray. Humphrey Bogart, Gloria Grahame. A delectable psychological thriller about the frustrated screenwriter.Josei no shori / The Victory of Women. JP 1946. D: Kenji Mizoguchi. Fkl / Fh. A really weak 16mm print. The reported duration was 84 min, actually 77 min. The lousy print again spoiled the experience. Good story: a court drama about a woman who has lost her husband and child. The defense attorney is portrayed by Kinyuo Tanaka, the embodiment of M's anima.Joyu Sumako no koi / The Love of Sumako, the Actress. JP 1947. D: Kenji Mizoguchi. A bleak 16mm print, annoying hum on the soundtrack. Reported duration 96 min, actually 85 min. A great film from the world of the theatre. The introduction of Western theatre (Ibsen, Shakespeare) to Japan. Sumako has to abandon home and family as she dedicates herself to the theatre, until then a forbidden profession for women. Starring, of course, Kinoyo Tanaka.Seven Chances / Seitsemän mahdollisuutta. US 1925. Buster Keaton. Fkl / Fst. Announced 75 min, actually 55 min. A masterpiece. The shy inhertior has to marry by a deadline in order to receive the millions. Finally all the women of the town are after him in a crazy chase, during the course of which K. calls forth an earthquake, among other things.The Pilgrim / Susi lammasten vaatteissa. US 1923. VHS. Magisterial, stark, absurd satire. In the role of the poker-faced preacher C. gets as closest to Keaton. The energy of the fireball is contained in the black robe.Dead End / Varjojen kadut (TV title 2003). US 1937. D: William Wyler. Lillian Hellman. Gregg Toland. Humphrey Bogart, Joel McCrea. VHS. Theatrical, finger-pointingly didactic crime play from New York's back streets. The slang sound unauthentic as everything else. Disappointed.

Saturday, January 01, 1983

STOCKHOLMA Day's Pleasure / Huviretki. US 1919. Charles Chaplin. tv. Good old slapstick, done with relish, without fuss.The Kid. tv [2] C's true style could evolve in his features. In his shorts there was not enough room for such an emotional register.The Roots of Rock'n'Roll 6. US. Fox TV. VHS. The conclusion of the lousy series. The narration of Pat Boone, Frankie Avalon, etc., provided unintentional comedy. Yet most clips (Bowie, Devo, Lovich) were brilliant.Les Maîtres fous. FR 1955. D: Jean Rouch. VHS. The anthropologist's wild vision of the initiation rites of the Hauka.La Chasse au lion à l'arc / Hunting the Lion with Bow and Arrow. FR 1965. D: Jean Rouch. VHS. An exciting account of an African ritual lion hunt that goes on for years.Jaguar. FR 1967. D: Jean Rouch. VHS. Ethnofiction. A young black man moves from a village to a port town. A Bildungsroman in the form of an anthropological movie. Humoristic and sensual as seems to be the case with R. always.Fanny och Alexander (cinema version). Astoria. The three-hour version is a disappointment. Gaudy and cliché-ridden. A homage to the "banal waltz tempo of life" (T. Mann).The Entity / Entity - tuntematon voima. US 1981. D: Sidney J. Furie. Barbara Hershey. Rigoletto. Partially impressive visionary fantasy. But the makers seem to take the parapsychological phenomena seriously.Cat People / Kissaihmiset. US 1982. D: Paul Schrader. Göta Lejon. Special effects shocks instead of horror. Contrived, guilt-ridden sex instead of sensuality....WEST BERLIN11.1.1983 a video evening with Helmut Arlt. Clips from Hit the Deck / Meripojat ankkurissa (US 1955, Roy Rowland), The Best Things In Life Are Free / Kaikki riippuu sinusta (US 1956, Michael Curtiz, Sheree North's dance in front of the prison is among the most electrifying things I have seen), Die Drei von der Tankstelle / Rakkautta ja bensiiniä (DE 1930, Wilhelm Thiele), and A Damsel in Distress.Boudu. tv [3]Poltergeist / Poltergeist. US 1982. D: Tobe Hooper. DF. Palast. An excellent and original horror movie, in which the mix of horror and comedy is right.The Thing / The Thing - "se" jostakin. US 1982. D: John Carpenter. DF. Alhambra. Mostly just a vehicle for the terrifying effects.Der Verlorene. DE 1951. D: Peter Lorre. tv. Acclaimed as the best post-war West German film. Tapping into the excitement of Weimar cinema, a circle of guilt and crime during the Third Reich.Le Carrosse d'or / Kultavaunut / Die goldene Karosse. IT/FR 1953. D: Jean Renoir. tv. DF. A stylized musical colour film inspired by commedia dell'arte. The master of realism as the master of spectacle. Focus on Anna Magnani.Holiday / Vakka kantensa valitsee. US 1937. D: George Cukor. tv. DF. Fast screwball comedy slaughtered by German dubbing.The Love Goddesses / Kauneuden jumalattaret. US 1965. D: Saul J. Turell & Graeme Ferguson. Helmut Arlt, 35mm. A wonderful introduction to the great love stars since Edison's Kiss. Louise Brooks, Brigitte Helm, Clara Bow, Marlene Dietrich, Jean Harlow, etc.The Black Room. US 1935. D: Roy William Neill. tv. A discovery from the golden age of horror. Boris Karloff in a dual role portrays the good and the bad brother. Good story, good art direction, Karloff at his best, Neill's directorial grip is strong.29.1.1983 a 8mm film evening at Gib Acht. DE c1982. Teufelsberg-Produktion: Vorfilms-Aufschnitt. Ropotow im Kampf gegen Terragörcs. Die Fanatischen oder Devil's Daughter. Wunderbarer Industru. Half-amusing. Goes to show that with a mini budget you can do almost as funny a film as with a super budget. But nothing earth-shaking.Wayne and Shuster Take an Affectionate Look at: W.C. Fields. TV episode. US 1965. A funny 45 min introduction, pretty lightweight.Mephisto / Mephisto. DE/HU/AT 1981. D: István Szabó. tv. I was not yet impressed.

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About Me

Antti Alanen (born 1955) is Film Programmer at National Audiovisual Institute (Finland), which runs the Cinema Orion in Helsinki. This diary is an irregular notebook and scrapbook of rough notes on films and related matters.

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